Voyeur

It was an honour, they'd said, a great honour to be chosen.
       They'd lied. This was no honour, it was slavery.

The Oracle glared sullenly, but without much enthusiasm, at the huge lump of ordinary looking granite looming up out of the cavern floor. Tied for eternity to a rock, his mind and dreams at the mercy of anyone who made it here to ask a question. Where was the honour of that?

He knew of his origins, naturally, he'd spent enough energy viewing the events in the past that had led up to his being chosen for this great honour. He'd seen the bewildered young woman clutching tearfully at the broad-shouldered man at her side as an officious temple official brusquely informed the pair of their unborn child's destiny.
       His parents.
       The Oracle's beautiful, expressive face fell – he didn't need his Stone-driven capabilities to access those memories, they were all his own.
      He'd grown up knowing who he was, that he was special, and he'd become accustomed to people's reserve with him. He'd been allowed to stay with his parents until he was old enough to feed and bathe himself and then they'd come for him, an impressive cortege of richly dressed temple attendants that filed solemnly into the centre of his small village. His mother, her eyes puffy and red from crying all the previous night, had handed him over while his stoic, silently grieving father looked on.
      One of the oracle's long-fingered, slender hands rose unconsciously to brush his shoulder – he could still feel the warm pressure of his mother's hand as she'd pushed him gently towards the grim-faced attendant with the glittering eyes. That was the second last touch he was to ever feel.
       He'd resided in partial seclusion in the Temple grounds at the base of the mountain, unsullied by physical contact. All his needs were provided for. He was given good food and sumptuous clothes, a rigorous education and companionship of sorts from his tutors and attendants. He was encouraged to exercise and hone his lithe young body to an athletic perfection over the years because only the best, most perfect of mortals could become the Oracle. And all the time he was reminded over and over again what a great honour it was for him.

He'd been eighteen when he'd led the procession up the treacherous mountain path to stand, clothed in gold, before the Oracle Stone. He'd raised his arms above his head, as instructed, and arched his back, feet braced apart to keep his balance. Long, long thick russet-brown hair that had never been cut brushed against the back of his thighs as he tipped his head back to expose a slender throat. He shivered at the unfamiliar sensation of another's touch, a broad hand almost tenderly stroking the hair away from his face. The hand moved to thread its fingers through the hair close to his scalp, holding him still for the stone knife to slash deeply into his throat. His blood had splattered over the Stone and the pact was sealed.
       The temple attendants stayed long enough to see him rouse from death, imbued with the non-life of the Stone, then they'd left without a murmur...

He'd tried to accept his fate, tried for so very long, until he couldn't ignore the depths of their betrayal any longer. He wasn't important, as he'd been led to believe, he was merely a conduit for the Stone, and now he was in place he was disregarded by those he'd considered friends. At first he'd welcomed the infrequent visits by the attendant-escorted querants, happy to see anyone at all, but after his friendly overtures had been rebuffed time and time again the Oracle realised the truth. They had no interest in him, they were only there to consult The Oracle.
      The Oracle's power could be subtle but viciously effective with a quick, angry intelligence to motivate it. The dreams of the more susceptible of the temple attendants became... uncomfortable enough to send them half-mad from lack of sleep. Watching from the depths of the mountain the Oracle had gained a fierce satisfaction from their discomfort – until one of them had flung himself off a precipice in an effort to escape the demons.
      The Oracle had been shaken and appalled. He'd only wanted to torment his betrayers, not kill them! The Oracle left off harassing the attendants and retreated into silence.

He'd tried, at first, scraping marks into the cave walls to represent the days, then the seasons, then the years, but let that discipline go when it became clear that obsessively trying to keep track of the time spent in bondage wasn't helping his sanity. It was better, easier, to drift along, subsumed in the Stone's dreams than try and stay focused on a world he didn't belong to any more.
      Time wound on unnoticed and eventually he'd ceased being surprised when new attendants replaced the old, remotely familiar ones. The mortals came and went, to his perception, like sparks from a fire, winking in and out of existence with the barest flicker of light. Their lives were too short to be meaningful but still they came to him, wanting to know about their laughable excuses for futures. Will I have control of this kingdom/woman/man/flock of goats? As if he cared. He couldn't bring himself to be interested in the querants that sought him out, but neither could he not answer their questions. The Stone compelled him to look then speak of what he saw. The askers were rarely pleased with what he had to say though, usually expecting justification for disasters caused by their outrageous stupidity. Frequently the querants tried to press him for more details, but he couldn't help even if he wanted to – he could only see what would happen, not divine the reasons for it.

The Oracle gazed at the skin on the back of his hand, still smooth and youthful after so long, despite the layers of grime. He couldn't remember the last time he'd ventured out of the cavern and a vague yearning sparked in his breast. It would be good to see the sun again, to stand and bask in its warmth... until the Stone inevitably tugged him back to its chill embrace. It was possible to leave the cavern, he knew; he could survive away from the Stone for a handspan of days. The Oracle's lips quirked mirthlessly. Survive wasn't the right word, he could remain animated for a short while. For something to survive it had to be alive first.

The Oracle spent the majority of his time pressed against the Stone, dreaming, but sometimes, for reasons he couldn't fathom, he'd emerge from the dreams agitated and angry, or so woefully sad he'd long for death again. But he couldn't kill himself, the Stone refused him that release, and when he'd hit upon the plan to demand a quester kill him in return for the information he'd been disappointed then as well. He had no life to take and the wounds had closed up swiftly before the terrified mortal's eyes as though they'd never been inflicted. It was no use, he was caught in this semblance of living with no escape until the Stone was prepared to let him go.
      That's what had happened to his predecessor.
      In an uncommon fit of curiosity, the Oracle had looked into the past. The previous Oracle, as far as he could surmise, had simply known one day his time was coming to an end. The filthy, bedraggled creature with the wild eyes had looked ahead a little to pinpoint his successor, informed the Temple then sat and waited for the close of his 'life' with a gleeful anticipation horrible to watch. It had been painless, as far as the current Oracle could tell, his predecessor had just... stopped, the day before he'd made his first and last journey up the path, and the attendants had taken the body somewhere deeper within the mountain.
      Fearful but quivering with a hopeful excitement, the Oracle had looked into his own future... and seen nothing. The Stone had use for him yet.

He'd been vaguely disturbed at the state of the previous Oracle but it was hardly surprising. Like him, he'd no need to eat and consequently no need to excrete in any form - they were just corpses animated by the Stone's magic after all. Plus the cavern was hardly pristine as it was and there was no water for washing anyway. Besides which, why should he want to comb his hair or wash the dirt from his body? It's not like he could fall ill from bad hygiene, and there was no-one to be clean for.
      The Oracle plucked at the filthy scrap of gold cloth slung around his slender hips, all that remained of the clothes he'd been sacrificed in. It mildly amused him he still clung to the remnants of modesty. He didn't need to be covered, he was impervious to the mountain's cold and felt no discomfort resting on bare rock, but it was reassuring somehow to have this small reminder of his humanity. Would he lower himself to ask the attendants for a replacement when this thin piece of fabric finally wore away? He didn't know, maybe by that time he'd be unconcerned by going about naked like an animal.

The Oracle had no interest in his body but there were times he remembered what it was like to touch and be touched in simple affection. He could remember the feel of his mother's hand stroking his hair and his father's all-encompassing hugs. At these times he experienced a strange, internal emptiness, a lonely, aching void in his chest that could take days to subside. At these times he would take conscious control of the Stone's dreaming.
      Mortals, he'd seen, were always touching each other. In love or anger, it didn't matter, it was like they couldn't help themselves. It was like they needed to reach out somehow, any how, to confirm their existence. Not all mortals did it, admittedly, a few eschewed all forms of contact and others were shunned, but none of them seemed all that happy to him.
      The Oracle's dream-prying had revealed another interesting fact about mortals and their touching...
      Apart from the basics he knew little about sex. He'd never witnessed his parents doing anything other than simple cuddling and the temple attendants were not only celibate but his tutors had disparaged what they called the 'rutting of beasts'. But... mortals in general seemed to indulge in an awful lot of very specific touching. The Oracle knew it was related to procreation, but why so much of it? And why so much activity that couldn't possibly lead to a new life?
      He'd touched himself, briefly, experimentally, the way he'd seen other males do and while it was pleasant he couldn't imagine why anyone would want to spend that much time on it. Maybe he couldn't understand because he wasn't mortal anymore? The Oracle pondered this question, and others like it, for days at a time. What would his life have been like if he hadn't been chosen for this great honour, this noble sacrifice? Would he have worked with metal, like his father? Would he have had a mate and children? What sort of person would he have been? Would he have had friends? Would he have been liked by his neighbours?
      The Oracle sighed morosely; it was futile of course, thinking about things that could never be, it would only serve to depress him.
      Sighing again, he stood up smoothly from his position crouched against the damnable Stone and loped around behind it to a section of the cavern wall hidden from view. He fondly ran his gaze over the mass of interconnected images and patterns that had been gouged into the rock with no great skill but infinite patience. He'd begun the carving a long, long time ago – it was a chart of sorts, a map of his solitary journey. The Oracle reached out to trace the angular characters in the heart of the design.
      Malachi.
      That was his name, the only thing he had left of himself, of the small boy who had trustingly left with the solemn strangers. The Oracle – Malachi – feared that if he lost his name he'd lose himself and truly go mad. He stroked the carved word again and smiled: as long as he knew who he was everything would be all right...

© 2004 February 2^nd Lutra

---

© 2003-2004 WordWrights

Back to the DarkRealm

Back to the Zone

Back to the Darkside